wheeling spices around Chicago on a
horse-drawn carriage to peddle seasonings
to meat makers. In the 1960s, the company
merged with Milwaukee Spices and relocated to its current location on the edges of
General Mitchell International Airport. After
a change of ownership in 2005, a trend of
reliable growth started and hasn’t let up to
this day.

Wixon doesn’t publish its sales numbers
but Gottsacker says they’re “north of $100
million,” with a compound annual growth
rate of about 12 percent over the last five
years. “We have doubled sales in the last
five years,” Gottsacker said.

The division showing the highest growth
this year is consumer products, which is up
18 percent after staying flat last year.

What’s driving the company’s success?
It all comes back to trends in packaged
foods.

A Taste of the Trends

“One of the big trends is that compa-nies want to fortify everything,” Gottsackerexplained. “We’re in a sweet spot becausethat trend alone has flavor challenges. Youcan’t just add protein to a bar or a cerealand expect it to taste good. So we have thetechnologies and flavor systems to make ittaste good.”Another big taste trend hitting the foodscene is alcohol — not for drinking, but forenhancing flavor. According to Gottsacker, aflavor like bourbon might be the next saltedchocolate caramel or pumpkin spice.

But there have also been big food industry trends lately that go behind popular
flavors of the day, and have caused companies like Wixon to reevaluate their formulas.
Mainly, the “free from” movement.

Ingredient sourcing has become a hot
button issue that has caused many major
corporations — including General Mills,
Panera Bread, Noodles & Company and
others — to ban or cut artificial flavors
from their ingredients.

“Label reading is a big trend,”Gottsacker said. “If the label has a big wordon it, people don’t like it. So many compa-nies say, ‘We don’t want to fight. We’ll justNow, many food companies have to lookto natural sources to produce the samemolecules as petroleum derivatives. It’s notalways an easy task.

To make a red dye from a beet, forexample, Gottsacker says the company